Prius v: 100,000 Mile Club

I'm at 124,xxx miles on my 2014 Prius v Two. Bought it new on September 10, 2014 with 17 miles.

Haven't had any mechanical trouble yet. The "ECO" light on the dashboard quit around 70,000 miles, and my wife swears that the gearshift used to light up when you put the headlights on... I don't remember that... but it isn't lighting up now.

I didn't like the stock Bridgestone Turanza tires. By 15,000 miles, I was getting a "whumwhumwhumwhumwhum" in one of them at speed, and it turned out to have developed a flat spot. Picked up a nail in another one and it developed a slow leak because of that. (Why can't the air pressure just expel the nails?) They only lasted 56,000 miles before tread wear made me have to replace them. I saved the two that got replaced earlier on, for use later if need be.

"Need be" came 4,000 miles ago. Had them mounted when I got a flat and had another tire that was almost bald, and one of the Turanzas has a thrum to it. For some reason, it's out of round... even though I stored it on its side in my garage and the tire mechanic never said that it looked odd when he put it on. I'll probably aim for 130,000 and then swap all four tires for the Yokohama Avid Ascend tires that were also original equipment. (The car had a "lifetime average" fuel economy of 44.3 mpg on the Turanzas, and now with 69,000 on the Continental Pure Contact tires I bought as replacements and one Douglas tire that I got when one of the Continentals picked up an irreparable nail hole, the lifetime average has gone down to 43.1 mpg... meaning that I'm getting maybe 42 mpg average with these tires.)

How do I know the car's lifetime fuel economy average? Simple. I never reset Trip A.

The only other problem I have had is that one of the hatch hinges broke a few months ago... but with how often we use the hatch, and how I failed to recognize the symptoms of it needing to be greased, I'm not surprised.

My only gripe is that the car just isn't big enough. I'd love to see a minivan with this powertrain. I fail to see why they can't put it in a Sienna, when the Highlander has a hybrid variant. I like the size of my 2003 Pontiac Montana, but alas, it only gets 22 - 25 mpg average per tank. If I could have a Sienna that got 35 - 40 mpg average, that'd be awesome. I'd even take the Prius's 4-cylinder powertrain in that Sienna, even if that meant that the Sienna didn't accelerate all that quickly, just to get 40 mpg average in a minivan.

 

Unfortunately, you can't just drop a small engine into a bigger car and expect it to perform slightly worse. You have to size the engine to the vehicle.

There was a Top Gear episode where they had a Prius go around their track as fast as it could with a BMW M3 following it. The BMW got better fuel economy than the Prius because it's engine was being pushed to the max. The BMW meanwhile with a lot more hp was just leisurely following the slow car.

I'd expect the same thing to happen in a Sienna with a Prius engine where it is at high rpm at all times to just get the van to speed. Remember when they had a 4 cyl option for the Sienna? What did it do? Like 1 or 2 mpg better than the much larger displacement V6? But it was much slower and louder and coarse than the V6. Few chose that option and it was axed.

Let's see how the new Chrysler Pacifica hybrid and plug in performs. No one has invested in a hybrid power train on a minivan my guess is because the minivan market has been shrinking. If the Pacifica does better than expected, you can expect other manufacturers to follow suit. I looked at a pretty closely 3 months ago but eek, that 40k price tag for the plug in scared me away.

 

I personally don't believe their numbers. IMPOV, technically, given the good BSFC even WOT the Prius has, I strongly believe they did cheat, we've never really saw the MFD did we? The leisurely driven M3 meant a very closed intake vane, thus much worse BFSC out of the enormous 4.0 V8, and dragging around a much heavier car on much larger wheels.

 

It's Top Gear. I would take any facts they give with a grain of salt but the point is the same. You drive the snot out of an engine and it will give very poor fuel economy.

 

When looking at the BSFC charts of the Atkinson 1NZ-FXE I never read above 250g/kwh (max rpm). I find very unlightly the Otto V8 part load (sport tuned, 100hp/lt) throw less than that.
Remember other episode they "drained" a Tesla Roadster, but really didn't.

 

I’m currently a little over 114,000. I’m going on 2 years of owning the car. I got it at 78,000 miles. So far I’ve had no issues which is more than I can say about my previous car when it started reaching these miles. So far, even in the coldest of New England winters. I average between 44-55 mpg without really trying. My last fill up, my tank was averaging 49 mpg. I travel about 500 miles a week for work alone; not counting running errands on my days off.

Overall I’m very satisfied with this car and I can’t believe how often I outdo the mpg rating. I hope this car lasts me for many many years to come. I always get the Maintenance done by the dealership. I just really love this car and feel pretty spoiled by how comfortable is to drive and it’s mpg numbers. My family loves it, especially on road trips and even on small errands, they always want to go in my car over my girlfriend Kia Sportage.

Went on a road trip a few weeks ago, 3 adults (including myself) and two kids and everyone enjoyed the ride, the reclining rear seats, the handy charge outlet in the trunk area so everyone was able to keep their phones charged during the drive. And of course, everyone ended up napping during the ride. When it’s just my girlfriend and her daughter, it’s no different, they recline their seats back and pass out

My friends, coworkers and even strangers are often blown away when they see it and the same question pops up..”that’s a Prius? It’s huge! What’s your mpg? Wow it’s so roomy inside!” One night at work, a trucker saw my car and asked those questions and said he had the regular Prius but it was to small for him. He asked if he could take pictures because his friend is a dealer. So I said sure and offered him to sit inside. He was all smiles and immediately FaceTimed his friend.

So yeah, I love this car, lol. I hope it lasts until Toyota makes a full ev that gets a similar range of a Tesla.

 

Just hit 130,00 a couple days ago. So far, everything has been going great. Last weekend, a buddy of mine and myself did a full EGR cleaning, intake manifold, throttle body cleaning and replaced some gaskets as well as PCV tubing(Everything that Nutzaboutbolts did in his Youtube videos). It was to badly clogged up, I'd say it was about 10% at best. Still glad I got it done and its a huge load off my mind after reading all the horror stories of how badly the EGR system gets clogged up once the miles start rolling past 100,000.

 

Just about 150,000 miles on ours. Got it with 128K or so. I originally did a LOT of work on it when I got it ( see link in signature ).

So far no discernible oil consumption to speak of....which is odd because our 2010 liftback consumes a fair amount of oil with only 120,000 or so miles on the ticker. I'm not complaining though!